Joe Maddon, Rays - He has become the most innovative manager in the game, one who gets the most out of a tiny payroll. He is the best at bringing along young players and having them grow as people, too.

Players like Elijah Dukes...Delmon Young..(wish I could have thrown in Hamilton)

I don't think it's fair to list Young with Dukes. Maybe I'm missing something but for Young's mistakes in the minors he has stayed out of trouble in the bigs as best I can recall.

Girardi, Showalter, and Washington 5-6-7 is a vast overbid.

7. Ron Washington, Rangers - Can’t argue with his success in leading Texas to back-to-back World Series appearances.

Actually, I can, and have.

5. Joe Girardi, Yankees - He does a nice job managing the game’s highest payroll. Easy? Not really. There are egos that he constantly has to massage. He does a good job mixing his instincts as a former player with his role as team leader.

I always love it when "managing the game's highest payroll" is seen as a talent indicator.

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Really, though, there remains no good way to rank managers, and as a group they leave a lot to be desired, mainly because they're so risk averse.

I kind of hate it, but Ray is very right. This is mostly a list of the longest tenured managers.

I always love it when "managing the game's highest payroll" is seen as a talent indicator.


In itself a big payroll shouldn't be a problem, but tell that to the alumni of Steinbrenner's Manager of the Month Club before Joe Torre came along.

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Really, though, there remains no good way to rank managers,

Chris's book does a pretty damn good job of it, but I agree that it's more of an art than a science.

#1- Dukes problems started long before Maddon was manager and in fact predate his getting into Professional baseball.

Ray - I agree that managers are often too risk averse but your complaints often seem like a "Wade Boggs failed 60% of the time, that's too much" type of argument to me. You should be ranking the managers against the managers unless you think that the best managers are actually not getting managerial jobs. I think that's a hard sell.

I do agree that it's kind of a tenure list more than anything else but I'm not expecting a lot from Cafardo.

To put another way Ray answer this; who are the top ten managers in the game? It seems to me that your position is that there are very few good managers in the game and it makes no sense that everyone at a given "position" would be bad. I think if that is your conclusion then your evaluation is wrong.

I'm not saying it needs to be a perfect bell curve but I think in your mind MLB managers are all at the left end of the curve.

Really, though, there remains no good way to rank managers, and as a group they leave a lot to be desired, mainly because they're so risk averse.

Yup. I think Maddon stands out there, and I agree with his ranking at number 1. It's also quite a bit easier to be an innovator in Tampa, where there's a lot less pressure.

This list is pretty crappy and AL-centric: 6 of the top 8 guys are AL guys. Pretty sure that's just based on who the writer sees the most.


Edit: I think the bench/bullpen performance is the best way to judge managers. Also Charlie Manuel is not a good manager. He's cost the Phillies playoff series through his inability to not spread out his lefties.

I know Leyland gets a lot of praise, but I find his management of the bullpen and debatable calls for hit-and-runs irritating.

Also, at #8 I think Bruce Bochy is too low. Dag Nabbit's comments about the man have made me view him with some respect. I'd certainly rate him ahead of Charlie Manuel.

I've been pleasantly surprised by Mattingly. A ranking of 20th may be too low, but it's only been one season.

Really, though, there remains no good way to rank managers,

What about by height?

this list is garbage. granted, i couldn't construct a good one either.

Players like Elijah Dukes...Delmon Young..

Who somebody in Tampa made sure weren't in Tampa for very long. I'll agree that the "grow as people" line is likely over the top but you can't argue that somebody in Tampa has done a pretty good job of figuring out who to move along (although in the case of Dukes and Hamilton that was pretty bloody obvious).

On Ray's point:

We probably don't agree in the specifics but come to much the same conclusion. But more specifically I'd just say that we have few good ways of measuring managerial performance and generally small sample sizes with which to do it. We don't have a clue how good they are at managing personalities, we don't really know if this "set role" thing improves bullpen performance, we have no idea what the impact of a manager who sucks at dealing with the press is on team performance (although it's probably a good sign the manager won't last long regardless), etc. In most cases, we don't know how big a role the manager plays in roster selection and we don't know how big a role the manager played in the success/failure of promising players.

We infer a lot of those things based on team and player performance (and maybe some news stories but news stories are always looking for some reason). The Rays have had a lot of young players develop -- so Maddon must be good at developing young players. Well, who knows?

Or take Aramis Ramirez. When he came to the Cubs, he was not exactly a bust but he was only an average 3B. He had major fielding problems and he was a mediocre hitter. There were news stories in late 2003 and early 2004 about Baker working with him. Regarding ARam's fielding (throwing, I forget which), Baker said something like "he had an obvious problem with the way he set his feet and we've fixed that". True? I don't know but ARam's fielding moved towards OK. ARam also started hitting really well in 2004. Baker? Cubs' hitting coach? Or just ARam's potential finally showing up?

I'm not saying it needs to be a perfect bell curve but I think in your mind MLB managers are all at the left end of the curve.

And most of them will be. You're talking 30 jobs out of a population of millions. Even if you limit it to former players, minor-league managers, college coaches, etc. you're talking a population of thousands. Unless baseball is screwing up royally, they're picking those 30 from a field of, what, the 100 best candidates out of those thousands. You're starting at the right end of the bell curve to begin with and it would be very hard to distinguish between #s, oh, 20 to 100 (think of top prospect lists for example) and the gap between, say, #1 and #4 may be as large as the one between #4 and #40.

So, yeah, I think ranking them is kinda silly. I think at best you could rank them elite, above-average, average and too soon to tell.* (Seriously, ranking Mattingly? Where's Sveum rank? Matheny? Ventura?) It would be good if we all stopped pretending we can measure with any precision stuff we don't have any tools to measure with precision.

Baseball's been around a long time and only 70 guys have made it to 1620 games (with Tracy (god!) and Manuel set to join them this season). According to b-r (not sure the timeframe) there have been 674 managers and nearly 60% of them managed fewer than 324 games. Mainly all we really know is that managers whose teams win tend to stay employed. (Or you dig in at the detail Dag does and maybe, among that group that's managed a lot of games, you can tease out some differences.)

*There's a tiny number of "below-average" that aren't "too soon to tell" but they seem pretty rare to me -- Mauch, probably Tracy, probably guys pre-war who were paid to sit there and not mind losing 90-100 games a year in Washington, St Louis (Browns) and Philadelphia (Phillies). I'm not sure there's more than 1-2 guys like that managing in any given year.

This is mostly a list of the longest tenured managers.

One would presume that the length of time a person is allowed to manage would be correlated to his abilities as a manager.

Really, though, there remains no good way to rank managers,


What about by height?

We could just give first prize to the one with the biggest t*ts. (h/t Monty Python)

Clearly among current guys, only Leyland's resume can go toe to toe with Davey Johnson's, right?

I mean that's not necessarily who the best manager is now, but those two seem to be a cut ahead of the next group in terms of accomplishments.

One would presume that the length of time a person is allowed to manage would be correlated to his abilities as a manager.

Counterpoint. Jim Tracy.

This list is pretty crappy and AL-centric: 6 of the top 8 guys are AL guys. Pretty sure that's just based on who the writer sees the most.

You're giving Cafardo way too much credit. He doesn't watch NL or AL games.

There's a tiny number of "below-average" that aren't "too soon to tell" but they seem pretty rare to me -- Mauch

Wait, you're saying Gene Mauch was a below average manager? I don't think I've ever seen anyone make that argument before.

One would presume that the length of time a person is allowed to manage would be correlated to his abilities as a manager.

Yes, but IIRC according to one of James's old studies, they are actually inversely correlated. Old dogs don't learn new tricks.

Correlations of Cafardo's 1-30 ranking with:

Games managed                   -57%
W-L%                            -48%
G>.500                          -46%
Alphabetical order by last name  16%
Weighted Average Division Finish  3%

Source: B-R

So it is a close tie for first with 27 contenders and three new guys are almost tied? Are there any bad, awful managers in this rating?
"consistent", "solid" "his own man" I am overwhelmed with the supporting data on these guys.

Always felt that if a career baseball guy like Dave Trembley, the fired and unlamented skipper of the Orioles, had gotten the job with the Yankees or the Rays, he would be high on such a list. If Mills or Acta don't get with a winning team , their manager abilities will not keep them on this list.

So it is a close tie for first with 27 contenders and three new guys are almost tied? Are there any bad, awful managers in this rating?
"consistent", "solid" "his own man" I am overwhelmed with the supporting data on these guys.

Always felt that if a career baseball guy like Dave Trembley, the fired and unlamented skipper of the Orioles, had gotten the job with the Yankees or the Rays, he would be high on such a list. If Mills or Acta don't get with a winning team , their manager abilities will not keep them on this list.

I'd guess that in any crop of 30 MLB managers, there are like 2-4 guys that actually add wins to their team, 10-15 guys that are pretty much average and will get as many wins as the talent justifies, 10 guys thast cost you a couple of wins with over managing, and bad bullpen handling, and 3-5 absolute disasters.

Edit: Yes, I know that means the average manager is a negative. I believe the studies have shown that, as a whole, managers cost their teams wins by overuse of small-ball strategies.

The idea that there are 13 MLB managers worse than Eric Wedge makes my brain hurt.

Ron Gardenhire and Davey Johnson are too low. I would not want Guillen managing my team.

Bud Black also seems a bit low -- granted, not the best record - but the Pads have almost always been sellers on his watch and he seems to keep the team nominally competitive with spare parts.

In fact, given the near-universal failure rate of pitching coaches-turned-manager.... Is Bud Black the "best" in this regard, albeit against disaster laden competition?

John Farrell's been perfectly cromulent, at least in the W-L category.

In fact, given the near-universal failure rate of pitching coaches-turned-manager.... Is Bud Black the "best" in this regard, albeit against disaster laden competition?

Roger Craig had a good run. A game over .500 over 9+ seasons with the Pads and Giants, with one pennant.

I agree that Bochy is/has been underrated. It seems like he was rejuvenated by changing teams, and I wonder if Scioscia going someplace else might have similar benefits. That team seems to have stagnated somewhat.

I wonder if Scioscia going someplace else might have similar benefits. That team seems to have stagnated somewhat.

Isn't the stagnation just shitty GM-ing?

Now, some of that may be on Scioscia's shoulders, but I think the team just wasn't well run under Reagins.

In fact, given the near-universal failure rate of pitching coaches-turned-manager.... Is Bud Black the "best" in this regard, albeit against disaster laden competition?

I wrote this when John Farrell, but I don't think it "near-universal failure" and instead we're subjected to a real small sample size. Roger Craig was a pretty good manager with a pennant, and Bud Black is pretty mediocre to good. Buck Rodgers, Jeff Torborg and Bob Lemon were pretty mediocre but certainly not bad. Joe Kerrigan, Phil Regan, Larry Rothschild, and Ray Miller were all bad.

If you took a random sampling of non-pitching coach managers, I'd guess your results would be about the same.

Buck Rodgers, Jeff Torborg and Bob Lemon were pretty mediocre but certainly not bad.

I'd say Buck was a rung or two above mediocre. I thought he generally did a pretty good job.

Chris's book does a pretty damn good job of it, but I agree that it's more of an art than a science.

Which in a lot of ways, is also true of managing.

Buck Rodgers, Jeff Torborg and Bob Lemon were pretty mediocre but certainly not bad.

Bob Lemon's record as a manager is very good. He won 85 games with a third-year expansion team, 90 games with a team that had lost 97 games the year before, and a World Series title.

I feel like in the modern baseball world, the main effects of the general manager, the manager, and the most important coaching staff members (hitting and pitching coaches, primarily) are less important than the interactions amongst them. I think the Braves really showed this in the 90's.... it wasn't that Schuerholz was great or Cox was great or Mazzone was great, necessarily. It was that the three of them worked insanely well together. Leyland is a great manager when he and his GM are in sync, and is basically horrible when they're not. Johnson is probably the same...

Baseball organizations are really too complex to evaluate on a person-by-person basis, it's really the whole organization that has to be evaluated together and I don't think any one person is overly responsible any of the major things we can see (and the individual things they are responsible for are generally not important on a unit-per-unit basis).

With Scioscia I wonder if he has a certain style that works when he has the personnel for it, but doesn't when he doesn't. Such as his preference for an offensive style that has hitters swinging early in the count and being aggressive on the bases.

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As to managers: the entire approach needs to change. The duties need to be split up, similar to the way there are offensive and defensive coordinators in football. There should be different managers running different aspects of the team -- tactics, clubhouse stuff, offense, pitching, etc.

The current approach is deeply flawed, and until there is a sea change in approach, managers will continue to be of dubious utility.

There should be different managers running different aspects of the team -- tactics, clubhouse stuff, offense, pitching, etc.

College of coaches!

But seriously, isn't this already the case? There is a hitting coach, a pitching coach. On the Royals, the first base coach was also the baserunning and defense coach. Manager makes the executive decisions, just like in football.

#39, the hitting coaches and pitching coaches literally have no decisionmaking authority within a game, other than discussing approaches to opposing hitters/pitchers.

In football it is routine (even if it is not the case in all setups) that the offensive coordinator literally calls the plays. Etc.

In baseball there are many fewer managerial decisions than there are in football and there is usually more time to make the decisions. No need to push the level of decision making down a level.

Yea, it isn't rocket science. Sometimes I think we make sports out to be more intellectually-challenging than it really is. I'm pretty sure one person could make all the executive decisions that need to be made during a game. Just because most of them do it poorly doesn't mean the job is too big for one man.

So, basically, the author likes every manager in baseball.

Where's Danny Murtagh and Casey Stengel on this list?
No list can be complete without those two guys......hell, they could probably manage from the grave.
Now that I think of it, they'ed have to nowadays.

Yea, it isn't rocket science. Sometimes I think we make sports out to be more intellectually-challenging than it really is. I'm pretty sure one person could make all the executive decisions that need to be made during a game. Just because most of them do it poorly doesn't mean the job is too big for one man.

Agreed. Part of the talent issue is you're constrained to guys with enough pro-baseball experience to be respected, but not smart enough that they could have lucrative careers outside of baseball.

Given today's salaries, if you're a bright MLB veteran, you'll almost certainly have the resources to get involved in business ventures that are more lucrative and fun than riding buses for 5 years managing in the minors in order to get a shot at the bigs.

In baseball there are many fewer managerial decisions than there are in football and there is usually more time to make the decisions. No need to push the level of decision making down a level.

Yeah, I'm wondering what exactly the offensive coach would do in baseball: call bunts, steals, and hit-and-runs? Whereas the defensive coach would call pitchouts and position the fielders, and the pitching coach would change pitchers and get them warmed up in the pen and maybe even call pitches? That would be analogous to football. It wouldn't make any sense.

Yeah, I'm wondering what exactly the offensive coach would do in baseball: call bunts, steals, and hit-and-runs?

And, if I know my Ray's Philosophy on Offensive Baseball, this coach's primarily responsibility would be not calling bunts, steals and hit-and-runs.